With the advent of flowformed superalloy gun barrels, the gun barrels can handle hotter barrel temperatures and be made thinner and lighter. However, the thinner the gun barrel, the more susceptible it is to deflection from firing vibrations, thereby rendering the gun barrel less accurate. With machine guns that “spray” the target, this may not be a big problem, but with rifles in general, and with sniper rifles in particular, this can be a significant problem. In fact, the barrels of sniper rifles typically do not get particularly hot since relatively few shots are fired at a time. For this reason, heat management is generally not a significant issue with the barrels of sniper rifles. However, vibration damping is a major issue as it relates to the barrel accuracy of sniper rifles. Today, the barrels of sniper rifles are sometimes up to an inch thick to dampen vibrations from firing.
In addition to snipers, almost any gun user (e.g., general infantry, sportsman, law enforcement officer, etc.) would generally prefer to dampen firing vibrations in their gun barrel so as to increase the accuracy of the gun barrel, so long as the means for dampening the firing vibrations did not add excessive weight, size, complexity and/or cost to the gun barrel.